And Then There Was Silence
by DarkHououmon
Summary: Rated PG13 for some blood, and character death. This is another alternate version of a scene from the movie. Those who've seen the movie knows that Eliza survived the fall into the river. But what if she didn't....? A very short and hopefully sad story.


Disclaimer: I do not own The Wild Thornberrys. Nickelodeon does. More specifically, Klasky-Csupo. 

Author's Note: This was an idea that came to me a while back. It has been simplified and shortened for easier reading. ; It's another one of those death stories. This would be my...3rd death story. ; I'm obsessed with these! For those of you who wondered what happens to Elizabeth from "On The Other Side", all I will say is that yes she recovers. I might do a small epilogue later, but I can't guarantee it. Oh, and I used the Spiderman movie theme song, "Hero", in here. Don't know if it fits the story, though. Oo;

On with zee story!

AND THEN THERE WAS SILENCE   
Story by DarkHououmon

Eliza sat on the lead elephant. The sparks had stopped shooting. She had done it. She smiled to herself. She watched as the elephants backed away from the electric fence. Her task was done. "It's okay, everyone." She said, but knew they couldn't understand her. The elephant that she was sitting on knew that she was there, but the elephant seemed to trust the child. Eliza may have met this elephant somewhere before. Unbeknownst to her, angry eyes were glaring at her. Sloan had his binoculars out, and stared at the girl on the elephant. He gritted his teeth, and shoved the item into the poacher next to him. "Come on, Bree! Get to the helicopter!" He ordered his wife. Eliza looked around her. She was surrounded by the large herd of elephants. She tried to see if her parents were nearby, but then she felt something grip her arm tightly. She screamed in surprise as she was lifted above the ground. She turned up, and saw Sloan. Her eyes widened in shock.

Eliza Thornberry struggled, her arm in his grasp. But the man wouldn't loosen up his grip. His cold eyes glared down at her, and she looked up at him with fear and anger in her eyes. "Put me down, Sloan!" She shouted angrily, pounding the man's hand with her free arm. But his only response was a laughter so chilling it would have frozen the water. She shuddered. "Oh, I don't think so..." His voice sounded more sinister than Kip's voice did. She glared at him harshly, and screamed, "What you are doing is awful!" She knew she shouldn't have said that, but her anger was getting the best of her. She quickly looked down, and realized that if Sloan did drop her just now, she might not survive the fall. They were a long way up...

Sloan snarled, "And what you are doing is stupid!" Suddenly, he smiled evilly, and pulled his arm back. Eliza felt his grip getting tighter, and she still had the look of fear plastered on her face. She refused to take her eyes off of him. Eliza felt herself being pulled back, and raised up even higher and closer to Sloan, who whispered harshly, "Too bad you won't be here to help me collect the ivory." His voice was full of sarcasm. Giving the girl one last squeeze, he gathered all of his energy into his arm, and swung forward, and released his grip on the child. He watched amused as the child fell towards the ground. Suddenly, his happiness was interrupted by something grabbing onto the helicopter. He looked and saw that the lead elephant had grabbed a hold of the machine, and she didn't look very happy. Sloan and Bree jumped down just as their helicopter crashed, and soon found themselves in the presence of thousands of large and mad elephants.

Eliza screamed loudly. It was loud enough for Debbie to hear, and she turned to see her sister falling into the river. "Eliza!" Debbie and Boko ran as fast as they could towards the river. Eliza had fallen into the water already, and soon surfaced, choking, "Help me!" Her eyes were shut tightly, and she struggled to breathe. She also struggled against the tough current. Debbie started to run into the river. "Debbie, no." Boko yelped, grabbing the hysterical teenager by the arm, and pulled her away. Debbie's legs were still knee-deep in the edge of the river, and she held her arm out to try and reach for her sister. "Eliza!" She screamed again, and she watched in shock as Eliza was swept downstream. Debbie felt herself sink to her knees in agony, and Boko looked at her with sympathy in his eyes.

Eliza tried to keep her head above the water. The current around her seemed to get stronger with every breath she took. She felt scared, and tried to move towards the shoreline. It seemed too far away in this condition. She was pushed again and again into the deep cold water, and swept further and further downstream. She felt herself panic when she felt her head slam into a rock, and started to feel weaker. _'I can't quit now!' _So she continued to fight to remain conscious. She noticed that she was loosing some blood. The water around her turned a light shade of red. A tear escaped her eyes. All that blood...it was making her dizzy. She looked up towards the surface and tried to swim for it, but the dizziness got the best of her, and blurred her vision. She could barely make out the outline of the evening sun.

She was relieved when she was finally able to grab the land. But now that she was on land, the gash on her head bled more rapidly now. She started to shiver. _'Why do I feel so cold?' _She looked down at herself. That was why...She was covered head to toe in freezing water. She wrapped her arms around herself tightly to try and keep warm. The ground was getting stained with her blood. She grew weaker. "I...think I'll...take a nap..." She whispered quietly, and sunk to her knees. She collapsed on her side, in a pool of her own blood. She closed her eyes, and let out a painful sigh as her body started to feel stiffer. And then there was silence...

Nigel and Marianne Thornberry stood glaring at the two main poachers responsible for the attempted massacre of the thousand elephants. Bree looked away, and allowed herself to be put into the jail car. Sloan did not give in without a fight. "If it wasn't for Eliza, I'd..." He stopped short when he heard a gasp. The officer who had a grip on him asked Nigel, "You know Eliza?" The red-haired man nodded. His wife responded, "She is our daughter." A dark chuckle escaped Sloan's throat. Both parents turned to the poacher. "Eliza is your daughter...Then you must be the documentarists that she told me about." He said in a dark voice. Marianne narrowed her eyes. "What have you done with her?" Nigel added, "I'll show you what happens when you..." "When I what?" Sloan asked sarcastically. "I did nothing to your daughter..." The parents looked relieved until Sloan continued, "Not within the last 5 minutes." Then he was thrown into the car along side with Bree.

"What? What could he have meant..." Marianne started, anticipating the worse. "Now, Marianne, let's not..." "MOM! DAD!" A female shouted at them. It wasn't Eliza; It was Debbie. She came running towards them. A native was running with her. She seemed to have been crying before. She stopped in front of her parents. "Debbie!" The woman exclaimed, and placed both her hands on the teenager's shoulders. "What is it?" Debbie panted a few times, trying to catch her breath. She finally pointed in the direction of the river. "Sloan threw Eliza...into that river." "What!" Marianne moved back in shock. "Why didn't you try and save her?" "I couldn't. The current was too strong and she disappeared before I could do anything. I can't find her..." She held back her tears, but also tried to remain strong.

"Where is she?" Nigel demanded, and tried not to sound mad. Debbie ran in the direction upon which she saw her sister fall. "Come this way!" They followed Debbie to the riverbank. "This is where I saw Eliza fall down." She looked at the river, and looked downstream. "I don't know where she is now." She looked to the ground, and felt shameness fill her heart. If only she had moved faster, she might have been able to save her sibling. Nigel walked a bit downstream, and gasped loudly. Marianne asked, "What is it?" "Look." He pointed towards the water, and Marianne could see tainted hints of red. "Blood." She whispered in shock. Boko couldn't understand the word 'blood', but he did know what was in the water, and he backed away from the river. Debbie overheard 'blood' and began to panic. "Blood?" She stared at her parents, and ran on the ground alongside the body of water.

Nigel, Marianne, and Boko took off after Debbie, and tried to catch up with the teenager. But she was soon a bit far ahead of them. She had her eyes closed, not wanting to believe the possibility that her sister might have not survived the fall. She should have looked where she was going, though, because she soon tripped over something soft and stiff. She fell face first into the ground. She struggled to her knees and coughed, spitting out all the dirt that had gotten in her mouth. "Yuck!" She wiped her mouth, and turned to glare at whatever had caused her fall. Her eyes softened, and her mouth dropped in horror. She clasped both her hands against her mouth, and moved towards the thing. It was her sister.

Debbie stared at her sister's lifeless body. She felt tears coming out of her eyes. Eliza was soaking wet, and there was a large gash on her head. There was a chance that she suffered head trauma, and there was little chance of her to survive. But Debbie believed that it was too late. She nudged her sister, and was horrified to learn that her body was already stiff like a board. "No..." She whispered as she slowly picked the child up. The younger sibling felt cold as ice, and she wasn't breathing. Debbie began to sob just as the others arrived on the scene.

"Eliza..." Marianne gasped in terror. She quickly shifted around and grabbed her husband, and cried into his shoulder. Nigel tried to comfort her, but he, too, was holding back breaking down. Boko turned his head away. It was grave news for them all. Eliza Thornberry...was dead. They heard footsteps approach them, but they paid no heed. Darwin emerged from the brush. He was startled by the unfamiliar noise, and came to investigate. But when he saw Eliza, it was more than he could bear. He didn't even make a noise. He could only stare, tears streaming down his face, at his best friend. _'No...It can't be true.'_ He told himself mentally. But he knew just as well as they did that it was true, and there was nothing they could do. He only twitched his ear once when he heard the familiar sound of Donnie chattering, but the boy stopped and looked at what everyone else was looking at. He saw the body of Eliza being held by Debbie, and he whimpered. He didn't cry, but for once he remained quiet. All that could be heard was the sound of sobbing.

And then there was silence...

Yeah, this is very short. I meant it to be like that. I never expected it to be very long at all. The reason? To make it easier for people to read it. I probably won't do this very often, though. I kinda like the title. It sort of fits the story, don't you think? Well, soon, possibly today, I'll post another new WT fanfic. I won't say anything about it except that it is about Sloan, from a totally different angle. It's a bit unique, since I hadn't thought of it until about a week ago... See ya. ; Oh! And a question: Why doesn't allow URL posting? Just curious.


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